MY HEART WILL GO ON
by thunderbird5
Summary: My friend. My guide. The one who gave me freedom. A tribute to my first guide dog Zahara. A huge thanks to my beta Darkflame's Pyre.


**Disclaimer: I do not own the boys, or the lovely song this fic is named for. The only thing I do own is the guide dog in this story. Zahara is my guide dog, and soon I'll have to let her go. Hope you like this one. Please review?**

Let me go back two years and a few months. Let me take you back to the day that my life changed forever.

It was on a rescue in South Africa, Cape Town, and I was just pulling a little girl out from beneath the remains of a fallen wall. The site was what had once been an apartment block for the disabled.

I had her safe in my grip. She was only tiny; perhaps five years old, and she wrapped her arms around my neck, and buried her little face in the chest of my uniform. There was a sudden, ominous rumble, and I heard the voices of my brothers shouting for me to get away from the pile of debris I had been balanced on.

I remember backing quickly away from the mess, but then there was a flash of brightness, and everything went black. My next memory was of a little hand holding on to mine. Begging me to wake up. When I did however, I guessed that I must have hit my head, as I could only see blurry faces, rather than anything that had any sort of clarity.

I felt the little girl hug me tight. "Thank you. You're my blue blonde angel!"

My next memory was at the hospital, where my eyesight hadn't gotten much clearer. I was told after numerous tests that I would have to wear glasses or contact lenses, as my vision wasn't expected to improve. I wasn't told that my eyesight would get worse though.

The first thing I began to notice was that the small numbers and letters on the screens on Thunderbird Five would start to jump and move, even with the glasses that I was wearing to correct my sight.

Maybe I'm just overdoing it? I asked myself uneasily.

But then, next time I was down on the island, I tripped down the stairs that led down to the pool. How could I have missed that? I began to get rather worried.

Then there came the day that I woke up and tried and failed to see the time flashing on my alarm clock. "Maybe my eyes just need a break." I thought.

Walking down to the kitchen, I realized that I couldn't properly see the expression on my older brother's face as he watched me feel my way to the coffee maker. As I finished making a cup of coffee and had taken a sip of it, I found that I couldn't see the small print on the cup.

I didn't notice it fall from my hand. I didn't feel someone grabbing me as I went to follow the cup to the floor.

_What's happening to me?_ I thought as I was hauled back to my feet by my older brother. He began to lead me along, but I realized, with a rising amount of terror that I could no longer see where we were going.

The next thing I knew, my brother was yelling into his watch at Virgil to get his butt down to the sickroom on the double. _So that's where he's taken me._ I thought. Lifting my hands, I started to rub at my eyes in an instinctual attempt to clear them, only to have them taken away again.

A really bright light made itself known, flashing into my eyes, and I tried to close them to block out the unwelcomingly-painful glare. I was seeing lots of stars by the time it vanished.

The rest of my memories have since then hidden themselves somewhere and am I unable to recall how I had made it to a rehab center.

_Surely my world is ending! _I thought as I was taken to a room which became mine for a month or so. During this time I learned to live with the little vision I had left. I also met other people like me, which was comforting. There were even youngsters that were only five or six years old. They didn't let their disability stop them from being themselves and let it be their boss. As one child had put it, very bluntly; "It's not my boss. _I'm_ the boss."

I thought about that for a while as I sat outside on one of the benches in the garden. That little one really drove home to me that I shouldn't be feeling sorry for myself. I should face it head on, and show it who's the boss around here!

As I got up later that afternoon to go have lunch, I nearly bowled over a really small girl who was singing as she walked.

Boy was I embarrassed then. I should have used my mobility skills to prevent such a thing from happening in the first place. She was only nine years old, but she was the cheeriest little thing despite her disability. Her laughter reminded me so much of the laugh I had known such a long time ago, from another time, that I just had to laugh with her.

Then there was this young teen. Fourteen years old and as hyper as Gordon, he was telling me and a few other people, very firmly and assuredly, that he was going to go to space one day. "I'm gonna walk on the moon. You'll see." He said. I knew that he would.

Then I was sent off to a guide-dog center. There I met my very first Labrador retriever. She was jet-black and her name was Zahara. I was told that she'd play tricks and try and run from the room without my permission. I was told if that happened that I should just hold on tight to her lead and not yell at her.

I was worried though. _What if she bites me, when I don't let go of the lead? Or what if she takes me for a ride down the hall?_ I thought as the trainer walked out my room and closed the door behind him, leaving me with the new dog.

The dog, my new companion turned to me, and before I could react I was on my back and a really cold nose started sniffing my feet. She started with my legs and walked her way up to my face, stepping on me as she went. I was too scared to move.

When she came to my face, I lifted my hand to protect myself from the rose of teeth I could just make them out. She seemed as though she was loving the fact that I was down on the ground and she on top of me. In my mind's eye I could just see her doggy smile.

Calming down a little, I looked her in the eye, or where I thought her eyes were, and I said in a calm and soft voice. "Hello girl. I'm John. Nice to meet you."

The nose came down again, and I got lots of doggy kisses. Trying and failing to dodge the licking dog, I got Zahara off of me and got knocked backwards again.

I knocked my head hard on the base of the bed as I came down, and I guess she thought that this time I was a really good seat to sit on. As I pushed her off again and sat up, she then ran to the door. Forgetting that her lead was still attached to my arm, I was honestly surprised as I went sliding along the floor. Once again I was down on the ground and getting extremely frustrated. _Damn. I'm so going to hurt tomorrow._ I thought miserably.

So we started our training together. She frightened me out of sleep the first few nights at the centre. At first I was unable to correct her and tell her to stay quiet. I was too afraid of this unknown creature. My mind wasn't helping much either. By the sound of her growls and barking, my thoughts conjured up I saw this black dog turn into a monster. I imagined it jumping at me with teeth glinting in the moonlight, snapping at me. I let out a shiver. Dragging my numb and exhausted body out of bed, I got onto her own sleep place at the foot of my own bed and pushed her down and begged her to stop so that I could sleep for the night.

At last my fear of getting killed by this dog got the better of me and before I knew it I was under the blankets curled up tight into a ball. Remembering that she was still tethered to my bed by a chain, I curled up even more. Just the sound of that chain and her growling and barking was making me panic. My heart felt like it was trying to get away from the danger. I knew that my watch was alerting Virgil back home that something wasn't right with me because of the bio-scanners, and then, I felt the watch vibrate on my wrist, I knew that Virgil was trying to call me. Turning my wrist just so without letting the monster know that I was still alive, I activated my watch and before I could say a word Virgil's voice came through. "Calm down John."

Turning my head just a bit to avoid the watch face and my brother I thought mutinously. _Calm down? Calm down and let that thing at the end of my bed come after me and kill me? No thanks!_

"John? John? Tell me what's going on?" Turning my wide eyes to the watch I said: "She's going to kill me Virgil!" I was sure that he to could here the barking and that growl.

Before Virgil could say another word to me however the monster at the end of my bed decided that its time to come after me. I felt my mattress go down and then I shot out from under the blankets and screeched. I didn't care what the people hearing it thought. I was going to die. I didn't know this dog, and I couldn't see where it was, even if I wanted to! I fell to my right and felt my side hit the table.

Letting out a painful groan, I again shot up and backed up against the bathroom door. After calming down just enough to move again I lifted my watch only to see that Virgil had gone.

Turning my head in the direction of the black monster I found that she was happily cleaning herself. As if nothing had even happened.

I shivered, and then rubbed at my ribs where I had hit my side, and got into bed listening to my 'guide' dogs soft growl every now and then. At some point someone came past the door talking about going to make themselves coffee. I let out a nervous chuckle as I heard my dog growl as to say. 'Keep on walking. Or I'll do the talking.'

I was calming down a little, and I couldn't help but laugh at the way I had reacted. _No wonder that person was going for some coffee. They probably got woken up by my scream. _I thought to myself; utterly embarrassed.

The next day I shot out of bed once again, as my guide started to growl. I wriggled too far across to the edge, and ended up in a heap of blankets on the floor. When I looked up I saw someone standing there, and I realized that it was my trainer standing with my guide dog correcting her behaviour. When the person waiting at the door came into my room and got down onto the ground to have a look at me, I realized that it was Virgil.

Thinking back on the night before, I couldn't help but hide my face. Feeling a hand rub my back, I looked up and I didn't have to be able to see to realize that my brother was watching me with his soft brown eyes. I knew that he had a knowing look on his face, and that he understood why I had been so scared the night before.

He stayed with me and Zahara for the remaining two weeks of our training. When we went home, my family asked me lots of questions and what they may and may not do with Zahara. She slowly became one of the family.

She loved the water just like Gordon. She would run with Scott in the mornings, watched Virgil as he played the piano, and she would run Alan over when he came into the room. She obviously liked the smell of him. Zahara loved licking at Grandma and Tin-Tin's hands when they came out of the kitchen. There was many a time that she had to be chased out of the garden by Kyrano, when she decided that she didn't like a certain plant or when something was under it. She always made me laugh when she would sniff suspiciously at the scent Brains had on him every time he came out of the lab.

She was very protective of me. She would sit there growling when someone tried to walk past my door. She'd begin to bark when someone used the door chime or knocked.

I remember that she once scared Gordon out of the prank he wanted to pull on me. And she would try to drink my father's coffee when he sat on the step in the mornings to read the newspaper.

My family adored her.

Then out of the blue it started. First Tin-Tin ended up in the sickroom because she had slipped in a puddle in the hallway. Then I stepped into one in my room next to my bed. Then I found dog pooh _under_ my bed.

Then it stopped suddenly. A few months went by with my dog just being her happy self; no problems at all.

It was around three months after I had gotten her, when we went to visit Penny. Parker took me aside and told me what he had found in Penny's room. I was mortified, and had no idea how she had even managed to get in there. Parker had just told me simply that he had already taken care of it when I offered to clean it up.

A few people ended up getting hurt from all the surprises Zahara was leaving everywhere; I fell down in the bathroom and bruised my shoulder, and Gordon jarred his back when he slipped on a puddle on the stairs.

After he and I had both been assured that my brother was going to be okay, my father had pushed me down into his office chair. He then gestured towards the video phone in front of me. "Either you call them and get this problem sorted, or else I'm sending her back myself."

I didn't hear him walk out. I knew that he wasn't mad at me.

Shaking my head in shame and embarrassment, I made the call and was told to go back to the center to get my dog retrained.

All went well in the fortnight we spent back at the centre, and we were soon back at home.

With all the things that had happened two years then went by. No problems! I was happy. My dog was sorted.

Or was she?

Again someone fell. This time it was Virgil. He didn't get hurt but he had to go for a bath again. Then poor Brains came into the lounge one morning with a pair of broken glasses. I knew instantly what had happened. Not wanting to get my butt dragged into the office again, I tried to teach my dog to let me know when she wanted to go. I took her out on the hours which the center had given me and between the hours too, just in case.

Thinking that I had sorted this little problem after a lot of hard work, I relaxed. But luck wasn't on my side at all. This time my father was the one stepping in my dog's mess and when his hand came down onto my arm as I went clean up the mess, I knew that it was time to give up and let her go.

Not wanting anyone to see me cry, I got up and after doing some thinking, and asking my dog what I should do to make her stop, I got up and sat down in front of my own video phone. This time I knew that I had to say the words that would break my heart.

When the lady from the administration building comes onto the screen, I can feel tears trying to make their way down my face. Shaking my head I say. "I'm sorry. But my dog has turned back to her old ways."

I hate myself. Here I am, about to cry like a baby. The woman begins to explain to me what to do, but before she can finish I shake my head. "Been there, done that. For two years I've done what was recommended. For two years I have tried to fix this problem. For two years I've been embarrassed by my dog. I'm sorry but I can't work with her any more." Hearing the lady sigh I lift my eyes to look at her.

Shaking her head she asks. "What do you want us to do John?" Rubbing at my eyes this time I whisper. "I have to let her go." Giving another sigh the woman asks me what kind of dog I want, and if I will let my dog work with me until I get a new one.

After ending the call I nearly jump a mile when someone embraces me from behind. Turning my head I see that my redheaded brother has somehow made it past my overprotective dog without her barking or growling. Maybe she is still sulking or something.

When my brother speaks I can hear that he has his 'serious' voice on. That what he is saying is something he means with all his heart. "You made the right decision John. We all have to let her go. This problem of hers is not your fault. You didn't do anything wrong."

Getting up I move away and sit down next to my dog, I rake my fingers through my hair. "How do you know how I feel? Do you even know? She's my first guide dog. The one who has given me the freedom to walk where I want, whenever I want. She was there when you guys couldn't be. Sh-she-." I can't hold back my tears and hurt any more. Getting up my dog licks at my face.

Pulling her to me I cry, I hold nothing back.

I can feel myself shaking, and my breath hitches as I tried to get words out. Before I know it, I felt many hands and arms are hugging me and my dog close. My family are telling me that they aren't mad at me or my dog. They love her too. It is hurting them as well; to know that in a few months from now or a year from now they will have to say goodbye to a family member.

At some point they leave. And then someone returns and they sit down on my bed. They're watching me. I start to sing a song I've known since the first time I had watched the Titanic. Despite how sappy it is, I feel that my very own Titanic is going to sink soon.

Letting my head rest on my dog's head, I whisper, "I love you Zahara. You'll always stay in my heart. I'll always remember you. Miss you. And wonder about you my girl. My pup… My friend. Feeling my brothers around me I hear them say. "We love you Zahara."


End file.
